Ever This Day
by Mirrordance
Summary: A series of one-shots of Dean as seen through the eyes of his overburdened, self-appointed guardian angel. Chapter 3 is set after Abandon All Hope: Jo Harvelle, Ana and Castiel have all – at some point - heard Dean Winchester's best line.
1. OTHAP: Light and Guard

Author: Mirrordance

Title: **Ever This Day**

Summary: A series of one-shots of Dean as seen through the eyes of his overburdened, self-appointed guardian angel. Chapter 1 is set days after OTHAP: While still in the hospital, the hunt finds the Winchesters when a mercy-killing ghost sets its sights on Dean.

**Hi gang!**

First off, thanks so much to all who read, favorited and especially all who reviewed my last fic, _Crash_. Below is a new offering from me, and it's the first of what's going to be a series of one-shots (working on three for now). The title of the series, as well as of each stand-alone chapter are based on a known prayer I remembered from Catholic school :) I'll probably post the whole thing eventually, but for those who want to get a google-ing, you can search for it under "Angel of God." Hope you enjoy the fic and let me know what you think about it. C&Cs are as welcome as always, and so without further ado, _Ever This Day 1: Light and Guard_.

" " "

**Ever This Day**

" " "

**1: Light and Guard**

_Days after _On the Head of a Pin_: While in the hospital, the hunt finds the Winchesters when a mercy-killing ghost sets its sights on Dean._

" " "

_"Watch the door."_

_Castiel did as he was told; he was no stranger to orders or to following them, and it seemed that when it came to his brother, Sam Winchester had that unquestionable tone down pat – _Follow me, don't ask questions.

_The angel stood by the doorframe, kept an eye and an ear tuned to every nuanced sight and sound of the quiet, midnight hospital corridor, and then the other eye and other ear into what was unfolding inside the room._

_Sam had barged in there just minutes earlier, his stride wide and purposeful, conquering every step. Visiting hours have long since past; Castiel had taken it upon himself to watch over Dean in Sam's necessary nightly absences. They never spoke of it, and Castiel doubted that the lately-deathly-quiet Dean told his brother either, but Sam did not look surprised to find him there._

_"Watch the door," he had said, simply, and Castiel did so. In perfect contrast, all of Sam's certainty and purpose seemed to melt away the closer he reached his older brother's bed. He laid a gentle hand on Dean's shoulder, all order gone from his tone, replaced by hesitation and earnest imploring._

_"Dean?" he called out quietly, "Wake up, man."_

_"S'm," Dean murmured; recognition and familiarity, always, before waking to true clarity. Bruised, dark-rimmed eyes fluttered open, settled on his younger brother's face, "Whatcha doin'?"_

_"We gotta get outta here," Sam explained, squeezing Dean's shoulder reassuringly before raking his eyes through the machines around his brother's bed, eyes darting left and right in consideration._

_"Okay," Dean said, seeking no explanation, shifted to push himself up. Sam grabbed him by the shoulders carefully, and then leaned him back to sit against the headboard._

_"Stay put a sec," Sam said, turning his attention to the banks of medical machinery; he toggled with this lever and that, explaining as he went, "Cops are sniffing around too close, man. I was keeping track of the radio. They're considering the 'attack' against you pretty damn serious, and then they found... that body, you know, in the warehouse. Tortured. Someone brought you up, and it's not gonna take 'em long to figure you're connected, especially after they realize the insurance I've given them is basically crap."_

_"Okay," Dean said again, his voice breathier now, his barely-recovered body finding the mere act of straightening up exhausting, and even more so after he pulled off the tube feeding him air from his face and over his head. He started removing the leads on his chest, the ones that tracked his vital signs, connecting to the machines Sam had just turned off. Sam sat on the bed next to him, grabbing at his hands to pull at the IVs vanishing into his skin._

_"I got this," Dean told him, "Find m'clothes."_

_"Closet to your left," Castiel found himself saying helpfully; all three of them were surprised, and then let it slip._

_Dean winced as he freed himself from the needles, while Sam shoved his brother's feet into his boots, and then draped the leather jacket over his brother's shoulders. The rest of the clothes he grimaced at and then just tossed aside; they were bloodied, irrecoverable. He planted Dean's feet on the floor; the bed was raised high enough that his heels barely reached the shiny linoleum. Dean squirmed closer to the edge, looking embarrassed, and put his weight onto his legs gingerly, even as he knew they wouldn't hold._

_Sam wound his older brother's arm over his shoulders, bore most of his weight as he walked them to the door, next to Castiel._

_"The way is clear for now," Castiel said, "But if you tell me where you wish to be taken, I can assure you I will get you there safely."_

_"We're _here_ because of you," Sam snapped indignantly._

_Castiel was in no mood to be cowed; "You will be caught without my assistance, Sam, you know it as well as I."_

_"We've done this before," Sam said, steely, "It's not the first time we've had to—Dean!" his older brother had drifted away completely, falling against him. At the risk of losing fingers, Castiel reached over to help and between them they managed to balance Dean._

_And then he didn't bother seeking permission, just spirited them out of there in a flutter of wings and the blink of an eye. Suddenly the they were outside in the crisp cool night, standing next to that infernal black car. Castiel knew where Sam had parked it; he knew where Sam _always_ parked it, within view of Dean's hospital window._

_Sam growled, did not bother to express gratitude. He settled Dean in the backseat, leaning against the door and the window behind the passenger side. And then hesitating, he stood in front of Castiel._

_"I have to go back inside," Sam said, "His medicine, there's a few other things he'll need..."_

_"I can--" Castiel found himself saying._

_"You won't know what to take," Sam said, eying the entrance to the hospital, and then Dean lying unconscious in the backseat, "I have to. So you gotta... you gotta watch him."_

_Now this was a command that sounded like it was being _wrenched_ from Sam. _

_"He gets a _goddamn_ cut on his finger," Sam said, and they both knew he added the curse to be perverse, "I rip your lungs out."_

_Castiel watched the younger Winchester walk away, again with those possessive strides eating up the road. And then he took up his post again, watching Dean sleep from outside the car, through the backseat window. The hunter still looked ill, drawn and beaten. This was not true sleep but exhaustion, a body pushed to its limits._

_There was a frown marring the space between Dean's eyes; it was a manifestation of his physical pain and mental apprehension, and so it was a manifestation of Castiel's inability to aid him. The nagging helplessness was not a new sensation._

_Castiel knew this body inside-out, having once restored it, bit by bit, back to Earth and back to health. He knew this vessel by the rings on its fingertips, the lines on its palm. The fresh scars and the bruises were almost an affront to Castiel's reconstructions, mocking his inability to protect, to ease, to comfort, to guide._

_Dean was leaning against the glass window at an awkward angle, and Castiel had the compulsion to put his hands into this one fixable thing, if nothing else. He eased into the backseat of the car's other side, and then leaned Dean's head against his shoulder. He wanted to think that Dean had sighed, settled in, became more comfortable. He wanted to think he had some power over all of this madness._

_Sam returned to find them that way, said nothing about it. The supplies he had commandeered from the hospital he dumped gloriously on the passenger seat, before setting a breathing mask on Dean's face and intricately arranging an IV line that connected a vein on the back of Dean's hand to a bag of clear fluid he had meticulously hung on the rearview mirror._

_"I told you it's not the first time we've had to run from a hospital," Sam said into the quiet, explaining, feeling Castiel's eyes on every movement he made. His tone turned soft, wistful, "This isn't so bad. The first time... the first time I thought I was gonna bawl my eyes out. Actually, I think I probably did. Should ask Dean... maybe later. He might remember."_

_"What do you mean?"_

_"We never had a lot of money growing up," Sam went on as he worked, "But I never thought of myself as poor, you know? Anything we needed to buy was a hustle or a bad credit card away, it was almost simple sometimes. But Dean got really hurt, once, had to stay in the hospital for a long time. The insurance was bad, and I could tell dad was worried 'cos he worked two shifts, started borrowing left and right, and I started selling ice cream at this mall after school and... you know, but there was just not enough money, and we were gonna get caught, so me and dad, we busted him out. I never felt so poor in my life." He finished the story with a sick, sour snicker thrown Castiel's way, "And that was when life was easy."_

_They drove moments after that, took to the road like they knew where they were going, straight and then at random turns, silent right up 'til night melted into morning. Sam pretended more certainty when Dean stirred awake; pulled over to a motel in the middle of nowhere as if he had planned it all along._

_Castiel left them after that, did not see them again until he received an urgent summoning from Sam. The summoning was a dark one, a trick he had likely picked up from that demon broad. But Castiel came nevertheless, and learned that a day into having been freed, Dean had taken ill, unable to eat or even drink. Castiel also learned that along the course of debilitating fevers emerged shattering, delirium-confessions: Dean had spilled his toxic secrets to his brother, told Sam that he had broken the first seal. That it was he, who began all of this._

_No wonder Sam looked scattered, the first that Castiel had ever seen him so._

_Castiel also learned that in between illness and injury, and heartsick hopelessness, the lines have blurred between Dean's physical incapacity and lack of desire to push harder to heal. When Castiel arrived, Sam could not even rouse him from a deep sleep._

_"We can't take him back to where he was," Sam said, already packing up his brother in warm clothes, "Bring him here, hurry." It was the name of a hospital four states away, written in a careful scrawl on a piece of paper. Castiel could imagine the care with which these words were written; this was the best that Sam could help his brother._

_"I'll follow," Sam said, adding in panicked humor, "Tell him I didn't leave his car behind, okay?"_

" " "

It was Dean who caught the hunt first.

Flat on his back in the hospital, his breaths still coming in tight and short, throat sore, bruised face swollen and spirit shaken, it was still he who had caught scent of the hunt first.

Granted, Sam was exhausted after practically two days of incessant driving to the hospital where his brother had been moved, aside from worrying about Dean's health and the implications of his own powers and his older brother's limitations. Granted, Castiel was mired in an angelic rebellion and the betrayal of a beloved comrade.

Still... it was theoretically a bit much to expect the broke, disheartened invalid to catch the hunt when no one else did. Especially when those who surrounded him were first, the unimaginably, darkly powerful younger brother who was so sure he could fix all of their problems by his choices, and second, the angel who had fancied himself to be Dean's guardian. The best and the brightest of both the darkest forces and the lightest, and still they both missed it where Dean did not.

On any other day, on any other hunt, this would have meant the problem would be solved. Dean on the scent of a job was relentless - driven by his father's command, or by his protectiveness for his younger brother, or by lonely desperation, or by passion for his work – the motives strong as they might have been were just reasons, and the job was just always simply _done_.

On any other day.

On any other hunt.

Today, there was a spirit standing over Dean's bed, looking down at him kindly. She'd have been beautiful, Castiel reflected – _on any other day_ – her lips generous but her smile sublime, her eyes warm and engaged, her skin glowing-translucent, her hair the color of liquid gold.

"He is mine," she told the angel.

"Leave him be," Castiel told her, calm and powerful, knowing full-well he could banish her with a thought, "You know what I am and what I can do." Because what was a mere mortal's restless spirit against an angel of the Lord?

"I do not take those who do not wish to be taken," she told him mildly, "What you are and what you are capable of doing to me is immaterial. If you destroy me, it does not mean he will still be yours."

It was emasculating, how truth rang in her words. The realization was abrupt and appropriately chilling; Castiel could banish her into darkness and destroy her, and yet doing so would not restore Dean to him. The Dean of the last few days had been lost, sick, disheartened, seemingly _irrecoverable_.

"You can smite me where I stand," she went on thoughtfully, "I know that. But you cannot take away that he wishes to join me, that he wishes for all his pain to end. I am more salvation to him than you. Ending me will not bring him back to you. He is broken and ill, and I am relief. Release him."

" " "

_"I do not think this is wise_,_" Castiel had told Dean, days earlier. The hunter was more revived after returning to the care of a hospital._

_Dean Winchester smiled a little to himself. It was subtle, just the faint glint of ironic humor from the corner of his eye, lips turning up just-so. Most people would not have noticed, but Castiel did because it was Dean's first smile since... since... he could find no reference in recent memory. _

_Dean's head was lowered as he worked, sheets of paper rustling in his shaking hands. Dean ignored the angel standing by his right elbow, pretending he was not there. There were three other people in the room – Dean's lead physician, the hospital lawyer who had drawn up the papers, and a social worker who was a patient advocate._

_"I know it's really not my place to be asking why you're doing this," the young male doctor, whose name tagged him as "_Dr. Stewart_" said uneasily, "Your prognosis for recovery is excellent, Dean; no permanent debilitating effects, some discomfort but minimal pain until full recovery... why you would do this now is beyond me. You're a young guy with great prospects ahead of you, an excellent future."_

_Castiel noted that small, ironic smile again, but Dean didn't look up from his work; he just kept signing page after page, "Since I'm doing so well," he said distractedly, "Then there's no harm in signing a '_Do Not Resuscitate_' order, is there?"_

_"No," Stewart conceded, "But you are still in considerable danger now, things can go south at any time. This setback you've had after your last hospital release is proof of that, and I don't see why we should be withholding life-saving procedures if they can bring you back on an excellent track--"_

_"I've made up my mind," Dean told him easily, "It's against my religion."_

_"Your religion," the doctor repeated flatly, at the exact same time as Castiel. Dean almost laughed, but his eyes looked hollow, ill, profoundly unhappy._

_"I'm very religious," Dean said, mock-gravely._

_"I do not think this is wise," Castiel said again._

_"This is tantamount to suicide," Stewart muttered, in frustration._

_Dean's eyes glinted dangerously. He looked up at the doctor, and almost absently handed the signed papers to the lawyer. It was an accusation that Dean loathed, Castiel knew. _

_"Does my judgment look compromised?" Dean snapped at him, "Do I have a history of suicidal tendencies? Are you implying I'm not in any position to make this decision?"_

_"Doctor Stewart is simply making sure you're properly informed," the lawyer filled in, looking at Stewart pointedly, "The hospital respects your decision and fully recognizes your right and capacity to--"_

_"Are we done here?" Dean asked, rubbing his face tiredly. His energy was sapped, and he sagged back against the pillows on his back._

_Stewart tsked and re-settled the tubes running from his patient's hand and the oxygen canula on his nose, which he had dislodged slightly by his movement._

_"I'm fine doc," Dean growled, waving him away in embarrassment._

_"I believe you will be but you're pretty damn far from it," Stewart said firmly, "Your temp's still not back down where we want it, we're looking after the fluid build-up in your--"_

_"Well I'm in great hands," Dean said, and his eyes could be so deep sometimes, conveying sincerity and gratitude when his mouth could not. Stewart was taken aback, stunned into silence and compliance._

_"I'll be back," Stewart said quietly, and stepped out of the room with the lawyer and the social worker in tow._

_"Are you?" Castiel asked Dean, when they were finally alone._

_"Am I what?"_

_"Trying to die?" Castiel clarified, plainly._

_"I should be dead," Dean said, "I should... be a lot of things."_

_"Remaining in hell one amongst them?" Castiel challenged him._

_"I'm tired," Dean said, "And you got a shit-load of work to do, looking for someone else to solve the problems I gave you. What the hell are you still doing here?"_

_"I told you," Castiel said, patiently insistent, "Our fate rests with you. It is your curse to have been the righteous man to break in hell, Dean. But ours is a kind God, the God of redemption, and it is your blessing to be the only one who can save us also and in this way, save yourself."_

_"And I told you," Dean growled, "Find someone else!" The angry exclamation irritated his healing throat, doubling him over with a deep, wet cough._

_Castiel winced in sympathy, "Have you discussed this with Sam? He should be arriving in a few hours."_

_Dean shifted in bed, his eyes lidded and heavy as his chest rose laboriously, chasing after his lost breaths. _

_"What am I, suicidal?" Dean asked wryly and after a few seconds, again with those sad, penetrating eyes, "You gonna tell on me?"_

_"Your burdens are heavy," Castiel told him gently, "He is your brother, and he cares for you deeply. Let yourself be comforted. You deserve to be eased, just as you deserve saving. Speak with him."_

_"I think I've been yapping a little too much already," Dean muttered, before folding in on himself, both in pain and in misery. He caught his breath and closed his eyes, "What did he look like, Cas, when he told you... when he told you I told him what I did?"_

_It was the first time Castiel contemplated lying._

_"You know what?" Dean said quickly, like he read the angel's beat of silence, "Please just leave me alone, Cas. You keep... keep screwin' with my head, and I can't... can't come out to play right now."_

_Castiel stared at him for a long time, as he drifted off to sleep. The angel reclaimed his seat by the bed, feeling at a loss._

" " "

_Of course_ he knew something that they didn't.

When Dean had signed the DNR, he knew something that Sam and Castiel – occupied as they were with worrying about Dean and the world coming down around their heads – decidedly did not. The ICU of the hospital had been getting an above-average rate of deaths across age-groups, across disease-types, just simply across the board. They had nothing in common except... except in every situation death could be looked upon as a kindness.

There was that 93-year-old who was always alone; the teenager with terminal cancer who was taken off of treatment; the comatose woman; the virtually-unscathed man who had lost both wife and child in the same car wreck he had just been in... the list went on. Dean had realized something was going on, but he kept it to himself.

Signing the DNR had been like a summoning, and Castiel did not put two and two together until he appeared in Dean's room – visiting hours had ended, which meant Sam was out and Castiel was in – and found a spirit standing by Dean's bed, her spectral hand touching Dean's forehead.

"Step away from him," Castiel had commanded, the moment everything made perfect sense.

She looked up at him, blinked in realization that he was not quite like the other beings she's ever come across. "You can see me," she said, and her voice was soothing, echo-like in the space between them. The walls seemed to embrace the sound, absorbing it into nothingness, so that he knew it was only he who could hear her and – to his profound fear – Dean, whose half-lidded eyes were watching her every move.

"You are not to take him," Castiel said, stepping forward threateningly.

"I do not take those who do not wish to be taken," she said, tilting her head, "I have heard of your kind - _Angel_."

"Then you should heed my words," Castiel threatened.

"He is mine," she told him.

"Leave him be," Castiel told her, "You know what I am and what I can do."

"I do not take those who do not wish to be taken," she told him mildly, "What you are and what you are capable of doing to me is immaterial. If you destroy me, it does not mean he will still be yours. You can smite me where I stand, I know that. But you cannot take away that he wishes to join me, that he wishes for all his pain to end.

"I am more salvation to him than you," she went on, absolutely certain, "Ending me will not bring him back to you. He is broken and ill, and I am relief. Release him."

"He just needs time."

"He is lost," she insisted, "He is broken and ill, and I am relief. Release him."

" " "

Castiel could not, he never could, not from the day they met.

_Laying siege to hell was foul business. The flames were hungry there, tongues of fire that licked at the skin of his soul, burning, scalding, seeping inside to the very core of him. The very center of his bones felt brittle and charred, the very vileness of the place making a home into his deepest self. Never had he been in hell; not for a moment before this, not for a breath. When he had breached that entry he had broken something inside, as one wrenches away a part of one's body, like he had taken out his own heart. The hurt was unimaginable, all-encompassing. He tasted fear in the air like it was a presence in his mouth, like blood clogging his throat or lodged tears that made his eyes pregnant, explosive, unbearable. There was nothing of his experience that compared. He did not know how he had kept his head and his purpose. He did not know how it was he, of all the angels who had taken to Lucifer's burning house to save Dean Winchester, could have been the one to find him._

_A mass of blood and burns and anguish, Dean stood at his most feral and naked and brutalized; he was victim and tormentor all at once, a rabid dog abused and then unleashed. He was hell's chief sufferer and tormentor. His hands were unarmed but his fingers were clawed and his eyes were steeped in madness. _

_Castiel saw him from afar; even from a distance he stood apart from the rest, glowing by both his menace and his unparalleled anguish. Castiel fought to reach Dean, even as the human tore into one soul after another, crying in bliss and release and suffering all at once. He was a sick dog that should be put down, un-salvageable, and for a long moment, Castiel wondered if they were doomed after all because their _fate rested with him... with _this abomination_.

_He fought to get to Dean Winchester, and was almost wishing he would fail. He did not want to be the one to reach him and touch him and be the one to realize before anyone else that all hope is lost; that the one they hoped could save them was doomed and broken. _

_But he reached Dean's side, blinked in indecision about what to do next. Dean whipped to face him, bared his bloodied teeth, dulled with _misuse_. But then the human blinked with indecision too, as if sensing that Castiel was different. Time stopped. _

_A low, keening sound started at the base of Dean's throat; it was animalistic still, devoid of higher thought, but strained with... with... an elusive sort-of despairing hope. His body started to tremble and he rocked, as if to comfort himself._

_Castiel looked him in the eye, "You are with me, now."_

_A_nd gripped him tight and raised him from perdition_._

" " "

"You will not take him," Castiel said, doubtless.

"But you cannot have him," she pointed out, "Must he linger like this?"

"He will heal," Castiel determined.

"He has chosen freedom," she said, "He has chosen relief."

Castiel looked at Dean's face, staring up at the spirit willingly, seeing nothing but her, seeing nothing but an exit. His chest rose in a massive exhale, like a sigh, like a goodbye. The machines around him started beeping frantically.

"Dean-!" he cried out, as doctors rushed the room past Castiel and surrounded the emptying body, oblivious to the spirit who was stealing Dean from their cause, and the angel trying to save him. Someone started on working to revive Dean, until another doctor called out for them to stop.

"He has a DNR," they said.

Everything stopped. Dean had stopped moving, stopped breathing, just... _stopped_. And everyone around him just watched.

It was not so drastic a change then, when the room came to a more literal standstill, just before the spirit taking Dean suddenly dissipated before Castiel in a despairing wail. In her place stood Castiel's superior, the angel Zachariah.

"You could have dispatched her more expediently," Zachariah chastised.

"We are supposed to respect the choices he makes," Castiel said nervously, looking down at Dean who looked very much to be dead.

"You can manipulate these choices, Castiel," Zachariah told him, "There is much to be said about the things that influence free will." He bit his lip in thought, "But you're right, he is languishing. He needs to return to his true path."

"His true path...?"

"He is a hunter," Zacahriah said emphatically.

And then time started up again, and Dean Smith had to wake up and go to work.

The End

May 4, 2010

**The Next Chapter: Be At My Side**

_Before, During and After _The End_: It's 2014, and Castiel is not quite sure what he wants back more - his old self, or the old Dean_.

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed :) 'Til the next post!


	2. The End: Be At My Side

Author: Mirrordance

Title: **Ever This Day**

Summary: A series of one-shots of Dean as seen through the eyes of his overburdened, self-appointed guardian angel. Set b_efore, during and after _The End_: It's 2014, and Castiel is not quite sure what he wants back more - his old self, or the old Dean_.

**Hi guys!**

First off, thanks to all who read, alert-ed, favorite-d and especially all who reviewed Chapter 1 of _Ever This Day: Light and Guard_. Below you will find stand-alone Chapter 2: _Be at My Side_, a part of which I've previewed in the afterword of a previously-posted fic, so it will be familiar to those who follow my work. For some reason, this fic has turned out into one of my personal favorites of all that I've written; I think it might be the dryer tone, or just this post-apocalyptic world and post-apocalyptic 2014 Dean incarnation that I find so absorbing. Nevertheless, I do hope you find this installment a good read. I wasn't going to post so soon, but I got excited for another Thursday night of Supernatural, haha, so I thought why not, haha. I'm still at work on Chapter 3, and may include more one-shots (both short and long, tags and case-fics, whichever comes to mind) to this series as I see fit, but for now, without further ado, _Be at My Side_:

" " "

**Ever This Day**

" " "

**2: Be At My Side**

_Before, During and After _The End_: It's 2014, and Castiel is not quite sure what he wants back more - his old self, or the old Dean_.

" " "

He missed being well and truly _high_.

Chemical substitutes worked marginally well, but they were hardly adequate. They were crutches where once he had wings, taking him deep into memories and distortions of them when once there had been truth and unparalleled beauty.

"Now I'm surrounded by shit," he declared absently, as he laid on his back and stared at the ratty old ceiling of his cabin. He'd just woken up, and these were the first words out his mouth. It could have been any other day, in this sense.

"And a good morning to you too."

Castiel grinned a little, closing his eyes and shaking his head in mixed amusement and dismay. Dean sat against the ledge of the window, a couple feet from the bed. His left hand rested lightly against his hip, the fingers drumming in his ever-movement.

"I didn't know you were sensitive," Castiel said, pushing up to his elbows. He winced in the pain the movement caused, and halted midway between lying down and sitting up. He leaned heavily and awkwardly against the headboard of his bed, "What brings our fearless leader to my neck of the woods?"

Dean had watched the entire exercise with a quirked brow, made no move to offer assistance. "I heard you got hurt."

"Worried about me?" Castiel smirked.

"I wanted to make sure you weren't malingering," Dean growled, "You've been 'hurt' and sat out missions before."

"As you can see," Castiel said grandly, hoping it masked the sting he felt at the rebuke, "I am neither high nor hungover this time. Are you happy?"

"No."

"Well why would you be," Castiel sighed, "You haven't been happy in years. Hey – hand me that, wouldja?" He nodded at an orange plastic container of pills an arm's reach away from Dean, perched pertly on top of a rickety table. It blinked at Castiel, offering relief.

Dean offered him another eloquent brow-quirk - "You kiddin'? Do I look like an enabler to you?"

"No, I'm fucking not," Castiel said, "I broke my foot, Dean. I _need_ the damn things this time 'cos I fucking hurt."

A moment of contemplation crossed Dean's green gaze. There was something in him, something that was thinking of giving in, before he shut it out. He picked up the bottle, and then walked across the room and placed it on the very top of a bookshelf.

"You are so perverse," Castiel said wearily, after his mouth opened and shut in a mad, scrambling search for words that matched his level of incredulity.

"I need you dried out and sober," Dean said as he walked to the door, "I need you thinking clearly."

"You don't need anybody, Dean," Castiel sighed, calling after him as the door clicked shut. He didn't mean it, wasn't sure why he said it.

" " "

Dean didn't visit him again, but maybe the bastard did worry even just a little bit, or felt guilty over acting like a douchebag because in the next few hours, a stack of back issues of _Busty Asian Beauties_ were delivered to Castiel's cabin for his amusement, and then days later, crutches that matched his height in the most unimaginably perfect way.

Said crutches were made of fresh wood, the same trees found surrounding the camp. They were irregular and natural-looking, but smooth and solid and finely cut and varnished. The handle grips were made of weathered leather, and Castiel thought the material looked familiar; that it had once belonged on Dean Winchester's back, when the jacket had been useful before getting ravaged and rendered unusable by the unkind years.

He ventured out of his cabin for the first time since getting injured. The air felt fresh and open, and he felt a little bit revived. The camp was in the middle of its usual bustle, people running back and forth, buffering up defenses, figuring out where to get the next meal as much as the next box of tampons. Someone in one of the cabins was of all things giving birth, her determined cries piercing the clear blue skies – it was not the first birth in the camp nor would it be the last – and life went on somehow, stubbornly.

He greeted friends he had passed, a lot of them comely women who cooed about his injured foot but who had not really visited him when he was stuck in bed. His taste in women tended toward the fatalistic hedonists, after all, and what fun was the stark realities offered up by a gloomy, drugged invalid? He did not mind; his purpose was clear, after all, and he clutched at the back issues of the magazines tightly as he made his way to Dean's cabin.

He knocked on the door smartly; Dean was more discreet in his affairs in the camp, but one never knew which lady could be rolling around naked in there. Knocking was one of the first human things he got used to, after being around Dean so much. There was some shuffling and muttering, but finally the door unlocked and Dean appeared by the crack of the open door, looking like he just came from bed.

"Whadja want?"

"Giving these back," Castiel said, raising up the magazines, "I didn't think they were mine for the keeping."

"You got that right," Dean said, almost-smiling. He opened the door wider and let the ex-angel in, and Castiel shut the door behind him and hobbled along to follow. Dean's cabin looked spartan, just a little-bit-lived in, as if the person who once owned this place had recently died.

Castiel put the magazines on the table where maps were laid out with Dean's work. His powerful scrawl was on miscellaneous pieces of paper, on the indents of books and maps. His trusty ballpoint pen looked haggard and overused and precious, bitemarks of thought on one end.

"Those are a bitch to come by now," Dean said of the magazines, "Wonder how many of those chicks have been turned, or if there's any of 'em still alive."

"Either way," said Castiel, "_Salut!_ to them for the endless hours of fun and amusement." Castiel sat down on one of the random seats in the cabin, watched Dean as he washed some dishes on the sink. One cup and a clean plate done with a flourish, and they looked clean and lonely.

"You didn't join everyone else for breakfast outside?" Castiel asked.

"I was busy," Dean said as he dried his hands, "And it's so fucking cold." Castiel noted the two button-down shirts he had over his tee, and the slight shudder.

"It's nice out," Castiel corrected with a frown, "You coming down with something?"

Dean flashed him a wicked grin, "Does it matter? We got a shitload to do and you know, with one man down--"

"Yeah, yeah," Castiel snorted, "Because I like having broken feet for enjoyment."

Dean coughed into his sleeve; it sounded rough, doubled him over a little bit.

"Maybe you should sit this next mission out," Castiel suggested, uncertain.

"Been thinkin about that," Dean admitted, eyes taking on a dark hue and a distant gaze, "Mick and Dana and that kid we found last week are pretty bad off though, so... what else do you do."

"Shit," Castiel muttered, "We're out of meds again?"

"They're going through the damn things like a bunch of addicts," Dean said, adding mock-gravely, "No offense."

"None taken," Castiel said mildly, "They're really bad off?"

"Yeah," Dean winced, "They've been waiting awhile too...those damn pills are getting harder and harder to find."

"You sure they can't wait a little bit more?" Castiel asked, looking down at his broken foot.

"For you?" Dean asked back, reading the regretful gaze very clearly, "You're gonna be laid up for awhile, man. Otherwise, you know who I'd have bothered first." Dean licked his lips thoughtfully, and his fingers drummed against his thigh again in anxious consideration.

"What?" Castiel prodded him.

"Nothing."

Castiel's brows rose in surprise. Dean looked like he did that first year Castiel had known him, and he never thought he'd see that again. He looked uncertain, unseated.

"Dean," Castiel said, more firmly and sternly that his mode lately, because if Dean can be his old self, Castiel could damn well try too, "What?"

"Like I said," Dean replied, and his eyes had shuttered again, "The damn pills are getting harder and harder to find. They're gonna run out eventually, and we're gonna watch 'em die one day - Mick and Dana and that kid and a whole lot of the chronically sick people we keep trying to save by getting medicine. They're gonna die one day, and we're just gonna have to watch. Can't help thinking... maybe we're just postponing the inevitable here."

Castiel felt like he just got punched in the gut, "You're not saying--"

"We keep sending the strong, healthy people out to get their medicine," Dean went on, "A lot of the time we end up getting hurt or killed. And the missions are getting more and more dangerous because as the years go by there's less and less left of modern medicine to be found. And all this crap for what? A lost fucking cause."

"So what?" Castiel snapped, "We just let them die?"

"It's going to—"

"Say it," Castiel commanded, sounding alien in reclaimed angel-form again for the first time in years even to his own ear, "Say it, and tell me what it tastes like."

"Either they die," Dean growled, "Or we all--"

"Say it!"

Dean's jaws tightened. He looked Castiel in the eye, and for a moment the angel thought he may have won. But then Dean's eyes hardened again, and gone was the hesitant, genuinely-bothered man that Castiel thought may have returned.

"We will let them die," Dean said, with finality, "It just does not make any sense to keep doing this."

Castiel felt ill, disgusted and the worst feeling of all for some reason of all these vile things was the disappointment. He had no words for it, nothing to justly encase the level of offense that he felt. And so he masked it, like he's long ago learned how.

"Sense- when has that ever been your strong suit?" Castiel countered, as flippantly as he could manage. He started hobbling for the door. It would have been a semi-graceful exit, the two of them going back to the old dance that was their norm of late; name-calling and snideness in a weird mashed-up camaraderie and dependence. No one else at camp truly knew either of them in better times except for the other, and they both loathed each other and loved each other equally for that knowledge. They shared a secret, or maybe it was harsher than that. Mutual blackmailing, more akin to a nice little stand-off. Dean had known Castiel when he was stronger, as an angel. Castiel knew Dean when he was – _arguably_, of course because Castiel most certainly felt differently – weaker, when he was Sam's older brother.

" " "

The camp, under Dean's leadership, was going to let the sickly die –_ maybe _-but apparently, _not today_. Not today because the next time Castiel sees Dean, he's seated on the passenger side of one of their few running jeeps, having just returned from the successful mission. They didn't lose anyone this time, and no one appeared to be hurt.

The people who greeted them were in a celebratory mood – patting him on the back as they unloaded the medical supplies and other goods the team had procured. Dean nodded at them dismissively, which was not atypical. But he made no move to rise from where he sat, and Castiel noted that while the other men helped to unload the supplies, one of Dean's grunts had closed rank on him, not leaving his side and not letting anyone else bother him. Castiel worriedly hobbled toward Dean faster, and the closer he got, the more apparent it became that something was wrong. Dean was pale, and shadows underlined his dull eyes. His shoulders shook twice in suppressed coughing.

"Dean--"

"Later," Dean barked at him, and only when the crowds started to disperse following the supplies did he push up to his feet, gripping at the jeep tightly. He swayed, and growled and slammed a fist against the vehicle in frustration at himself.

"What happened?" Castiel asked the man beside Dean, one of his more reliable grunts, a towering man named Yager.

"He's kinda sick," the man replied, and gigantic and imposing as he was, his hands hovered at Dean's elbow uncertainly, knowing that any unwarranted assistance and he was going to get his ass handed to him, "Collapsed after we finished the job. Scared the shit outta us."

Dean glared as he was told on, and then looked worriedly up at the groups of people still mulling around. He did not want to be seen like this.

"You gonna keep yappin or are you gonna get me outta here?" he rasped at them.

" " "

They settled Dean in bed, and Castiel found himself lingering, even after Dean thanked Yager gruffly. For a moment there, Yager had mistaken it for some sort of invitation to stay, causing Dean to bark at him to get the hell out to work and just leave him alone. He was surly when feeling badly, Castiel has known this for years.

"You too, cripple," he muttered as Castiel, before turning his back on the ex-angel, fully-clothed with his shoes on.

Castiel just sighed, set his crutches aside and sat by Dean's knees. He started working on unlacing the other man's boots. Dean kicked his legs to dislodge Castiel's grip.

"Dude, get off me!" Dean bellowed with futility, coughing as he went.

"Shut up and have a modicum of dignity about this," Castiel told him simply, unlacing the boots and tugging them free, before gracelessly tossing them to the floor, "Now was that so hard?"

Dean just groaned, pressed his palms against his eyes. He shifted restlessly, breathing hard and moaning low. "I don't know where the fuck to put my fucking head."

"I have some standard stuff," Castiel said, drawing out a couple of pill bottles from his pockets. He looked through them and selected a Tylenol.

"Walking pharmacy," Dean said wryly, before opening up his palm and accepting the offering. He dry-swallowed the two white pills, closed his eyes for a moment before looking at Castiel meaningfully, "You really should get a handle on that."

"I thought you'd ah..." Castiel hesitated, "You've quit trying to make me a better man a couple years ago."

"Yeah?" Dean asked, sounding surprised.

Castiel snorted a little, "I was the angel and you were doing all the converting. At the start it was saving towns instead of destroying them for the greater good. And then it was to decide my own fate, exercise my free will. And then it was to wine, women and song. And then a little bit less of the wine and the women, and certainly nothing of... of the drugs. You stopped, a couple years back. I didn't know if I should be relieved or insulted that you've finally written me off."

"I haven't quit," Dean argued, though he did not sound all that convinced himself.

"You should get some rest," Castiel said, getting up from the bed and arranging his crutches again, "I'll go catch up to Yager, lend him my shoulder to cry on."

"I wasn't that mean," Dean said indignantly.

"_Rest_, Dean," Castiel said emphatically, "I'll check on you later."

"I'm fine," Dean called out, "You don't have to."

" " "

But Dean wasn't, and Castiel was glad he did, because he found Dean burning up in waves of fierce heat that emanated from his skin. The very air surrounding his body felt charged and radiant, like he could have glowed with it. He was lethargic, not shaking or moving at all, like he was just dead weight sinking into his bed. His heart was pounding a mile a minute, but his breaths came in long, laboriously searching inhales and short, sudden exhales long moments apart. It took Castiel three desperate and increasingly louder tries before he stirred awake.

"Dean!" Castiel exclaimed when the dulled pools of green settled on his face, "Dean, you with me?"

"Get me down," Dean begged, and the despairing tone and completely disarmed expression tugged at Castiel's heart, "Please. I'm burnin' up here."

Castiel frowned; of course he knew that story, of how Dean's mother had burned up, pinned to the ceiling. Dean in bed was heavily immobilized by his illness, unable to move his head, his arms, barely even able to move his eyes and shift his weary gaze.

Castiel was dumbfounded, robbed of words. He wished he could comfort, he wished he could ease, he wished he still had the power to heal. But if we were being ambitious anyway, he wished he could just fly and get them all away from here.

Dean blinked at him, seemed to come more and more awake after each one. Blink one and he realized where he was. Blink two and he realized he'd just been dreaming. Blink three he realized – by the stricken look on Castiel's face – that he'd said the unmentionable out loud.

"Strap on your angel wings," Dean said, grin slick and oily and inadequate to cover up what had already been revealed, "And get me down, right?"

"We'll work on the fever first," Castiel told him quietly after a beat, finding more familiarity in the hastily-patched-up humor and pretension, "And then work on the other stuff later."

"Got any more of those pills?" Dean asked.

"I don't think the last ones did you any good," Castiel said, hobbling around and grabbing Dean a glass of water. He also wet a raggedy kitchen towel he found lying around and juggled them with his crutches as he went back to sit on a corner of Dean's bed.

"You're just being selfish," Dean deduced.

"Yes, I am," Castiel said obtusely, moved to lay the wet cloth over Dean's burning forehead.

"Yuck, man, I use that to clean the house," Dean protested, squirming away.

"Come on, you haven't cleaned in years," Castiel told him, "'Sides, you can deal with a little dirt after you survive getting your brain cooked."

"It's not that bad," Dean protested, but did leave the towel where Castiel put it. He took a couple of deep breaths, and then let the coolness soothe him. He sighed with some relief, "Dude, seriously – got any more of those pills?"

"I don't wanna give you anything 'til the doc takes a look at you," Castiel said.

"Aw come on," Dean groaned, this time moving his head from side to side in profound displeasure. The wet rag fell to the pillow beside his head, "Zuck's a quack."

"He's the only one we got," Castiel said, "And he's hardly a quack – he did two tours as a medic in Iraq and Afghanistan, and he was an EMT."

Dean looked at him skeptically, "He looks like a quack."

"He went native when the shit hit the fan," Castiel said, "When he's lucid he's okay."

"How do you even know this crap," Dean muttered.

"If you took the time to get to know some of the people you've been helping keep alive in this camp--" Castiel began to admonish him.

"Ugh," Dean suddenly groaned, and he pressed his eyes shut and his lips together. Castiel could see his Adam's apple bob up and down, and he wondered if he could find and get a bucket fast enough to keep a total explosive mess from – as abruptly as it began, the spell ended, and Dean's coiled body relaxed, just slid into complete and utter bonelessness.

Castiel exhaled in relief, a beat before wondering if this was in fact, worse than if Dean had thrown up and gotten sick all over the two of them.

"Dean?" he called out quietly, "Dean, you with me?"

He wasn't. He was out like a light, no one's home, and it scared the crap out of the former-angel. Castiel placed a hand on Dean's shoulder – _god_, did that feel familiar – tugged at him, shook him.

"Dean!" he yelled, "Come on!"

Still without a response, the injured Castiel unthinkingly took to his feet, forgetting that he could not run for help, that he could not run for _anything_. He cried out in pain and surprise, falling to the floor in a messy heap of cast and curses. He clutched at the casted area, just pressed at it like he could keep the blinding flare of the hurt of it inside, hissed at himself.

Dean stirred, moaned low and turned his face toward where Castiel lay. Surprised, Castiel blinked at Dean, called out again, "Dean, you in there?"

No response.

"Dean..." Castiel hesitated, "Help me?"

Dean moaned again, and the fallen angel was surprised enough to let a low chuckle escape from his pains, "You didn't turn into a complete douchebag after all, huh?" He pulled himself up to sit on Dean's bed, right by the ailing hunter's arm, panting from exertion.

"Dean, help me," Castiel said earnestly, "Wake up, please."

Green eyes fluttered open, and they looked oppressed. Caught right smack in the middle of a rock and a hard place at every turn: between a desire to rest and the weight of responsibility, between love and hate, between light and dark, between feeling nothing and feeling everything.

"Should've known that would get you to come around," Castiel murmured, "I'm getting the doc, all right?"

"Not..." Dean stammered, "Not in the light."

Castiel thought for a second that he wasn't really awake after all, "What?"

"In the dark," Dean swallowed thickly, "Keep it quiet. No one else knows."

Castiel bit his lip and nodded. Their camp was a well-functioning one by most accounts, but there were communal scars there, deep and vulnerable, with perfect order sitting just on the edge of chaos. Dean was that one line separating the two. As the founder of the camp, everyone looked to him for what to do. That focal position was something Castiel doubted the hunter appreciated, but when has life ever tossed Dean Winchester a bone? He started out helping just one or two people who suddenly realized they were safer following him around and wouldn't leave him alone. And then the parade grew and here they all were.

The last time Dean got hurt, there was like a cloud over the camp, and nothing worked properly. They started fighting about what to do, where to go, who got the final say. In many ways he was like the sun to them, where things revolved. Dean hated it but he took it – both the responsibility and the adoration - because god knew none of them would leave him alone. In the early days just after they settled here, Castiel remembered seeing Dean stand on the edge of the camp's enclosure, head tilted, gaze long and lost past it, out into the rest of the world.

_"You're thinking of leaving us," the former angel said flatly, making his displeasure known, if not his shattering disappointment._

_It took forever for Dean to turn back to him. He covered up a thoughtful gaze with a smirk, "If I said I was thinking of bringing you with me, would that make you less pissed?"_

_Castiel snorted at him, "You'd have said that to anyone who spotted you out here."_

_"True," Dean lied. Neither of them bothered with kicking that issue open._

_"They need you," Castiel implored him._

_"What do I need?" Dean countered._

_"I don't know," Castiel admitted, "But I don't think it's out there_."

_"Nothing's out there," Dean agreed, adding quietly, "And nothing's in here. I got nothing." He pressed his lips together, and then turned and faced Castiel fully, "You ever think of leavin'? 'Cos everyone... everyone leaves."_

Me_, was the tale end of that unmentionable thing._

_"Everyday," Castiel confessed, and there was no better term than that; "confession." To have to lay these truths – sins - bare, right there on the ground before his confessor, offer them up for condemnation or forgiveness._

_"I ever said I was sorry for getting you into this mess?" Dean asked him. Castiel was caught off-guard, because it was beginning to sound like they were apologizing to each other. Dean for... for advocating free will, Castiel supposed and Castiel for... for not not wanting it?_

_"It's not blame that falls on you, Dean," Castiel assured him._

_"And it's okay to wanna get away from all this crap," Dean returned, "I mean, _I _want out. But damn it, Cas," he laughed, and it was sickening how genuine the mirth was in his eyes, "I can't seem to fucking die, like it's some goddamn joke."_

" " "

_Maybe he is a quack_, Castiel thought darkly, glaring at the doctor who gave him the diagnosis as _Fever of Unknown Origin_.

"The hell does that mean?" Castiel snapped.

"Just what it says," Zucker replied, and he tried to shrug and be straightforward about all this, but he was as much a scarred survivor as all of them; having been called into Dean's cabin late in the night to find him fevered and half-conscious scared him, and even know his eyes looked like they were staring down a bleak, bleak future.

"Listen, Cas," Zucker said, tone turning low and mournful and just a little bit angry, "I'm good at what I do – I mean when I'm lucid -"

"Funny, that's exactly what he said," Dean interjected drowsily. The two more clear-headed men in the room ignored the quip.

"But this situation," Zucker motioned to the general rough conditions around them, "I'm as good as my tools allow, and we have nothing to work with here, you see? _Nothing_. Some fucking doctor you'd make with just your bare fucking hands. I got people dyin' who a couple of years ago could've just been in and out a pharmacy, you know? A fever this high... could be anything from standard flu to internal organ infection, but I can't fuckin' know, all right?"

"Okay, jeez," Castiel said, running a hand wearily over his face, "_Fuck_. Okay. Okay, now what do we do?"

"Well I'll be keeping an eye on that fever and any other symptom that pops out," Zucker replied, "We might get a better handle on what we're dealing with if I spot anything else. Say... didn't he go on that run to get the meds yesterday? Where'd they get 'em from? If it was a lab of some kind, there could be all sorts of shit-diseases cultured and left alone in there."

"No, he was coming down with something before that," Castiel said, remembering his conversation with Dean before the mission, "He was coughing, and he was cold."

"Well that's a relief," Zucker, "Probably something more basic then. Wouldn't suddenly wanna be dealing with Ebola or whatever."

"You shouldn't talk like that," Castiel told him, "You're gonna freak everyone out."

"Shit," Zucker remarked, undoubtedly remembering as Castiel did what had happened the last time the world tried to take Dean from them, "That last time he got hurt was a nightmare. I thought people were gonna dine on my balls if I didn't get fearless leader back on his feet."

"That visual is... unwelcome," Castiel said, "So. What? And he wants this kept quiet, by the way."

"In this camp?" Zucker snorted, "Not happening. You're better off just saying some semblance of the truth. Fearless leader's picked up a bug like the next guy – hell, he don't always seem like it, but he's human, ain't he?"

" " "

_All too much_, Castiel would agree, days later, when the fever got so high that Dean started to moan and cry in his sleep, writhing, tangled in his sheets and asking for his brother, his father, his mom. Castiel loathed his damned broken foot in that moment, because he needed Zucker around to help take care of Dean when all he wanted was for there to be no witnesses other than himself to this vulnerability.

"Who's Sam?" Zucker asked.

"I don't know," Castiel lied.

They stripped him down to his underwear, enlisted the help of the massive Yager to get him in an ice bath. One more necessary goddamn witness to Dean's wilting mask, but Castiel had no choice. Chuck dropped by fairly frequently too, offering up extra provisions that the people in camp had happily given up to restore Dean to health. He, Zucker, Yager and Castiel were the only ones in the camp both cursed and privileged to witness Dean's unfolding while he was ill.

"Sam, oh god..." Dean moaned, as he was lowered into the freezing cold water. He jerked instinctively, but hands held him down, and he flailed at them with limbs weak and useless.

"You know who Sam is?" Zucker asked Chuck and Yager.

"No," Yager said at the same moment Chuck said "Yes."

Zucker's eyes lit up, "Yeah?"

"No one knows who Sam is," Castiel insisted darkly, making his will clear and known. He held Dean down to the water, one hand on his shoulder and the other holding up his head.

"Okay," Zucker said with a shrug, before nodding at Castiel's hand sitting on the print over Dean's shoulder, "Hey. Funny, but that fits right in, don't it?"

" " "

He got better.

They all did; Dean fought off the bug, the camp got its leader back, Castiel slowly regained more mobility. But the impossible Zucker went and asked Dean who Sam was, and the sole remaining Winchester's eyes glinted with danger and rage. He looked like he'd been assaulted, looked like he was going to throw a punch. The doc bit his tongue about the issue since, but Dean had realized he'd opened his mouth one more time too many while he was ill, and almost to overcompensate for the vulnerability that had released _Sam_ into this world again and let him invade Dean's carefully-constructed, barely-surviving psyche again, he'd turned to work like the devil in a workshop.

"You're scaring people," Castiel told him in a low tone once, after Dean had interrogated a demon in an unprecedented reckless mess of sheer, heartless efficiency.

"Good," Dean looked at him pointedly, "Maybe they'd get a hint and fuck off."

" " "

Maybe he had a little bit of his angel-mojo left.

Maybe it was because he was high, and the distinct aura coming from people was streaming out of them in swirling neon waves.

Maybe they were that much different, now. But months later, he would turn to face Dean and his hippie accusations, only to find, without a single doubt in his mind, that he was looking at someone else.

_"Whoa, strange," he had said, and that didn't even begin to cover it._

_It wasn't Now-Dean._

_"What year are you from?" _

_"2009," Dean-2009 replied, and it was straightforward and just damned weird that people can have conversations like this in the same tone as asking about the weather. _It's windy_..._

_Castiel straightened, tried to get some lucidity back and _god_ when was it ever this hard? "Who did this to you?" _What was the name of that goddamn son-of-a--_ "Is it Zachariah?"_

_"Yes," came the heated, simple response._

_Castiel let that little piece of information simmer, wished to god he was more sober and could come up with a better word than "Interesting."_

_"Oh yeah, it's freaking fascinating," came that mocking retort; Castiel had forgotten that mockery took effort and energy that Now-Dean didn't do so much anymore. To miss being mocked, _god_, he was high._

_"Now," Dean-2009 said, slapping his hands together purposefully, "Why don't you strap on your angel wings and--"_

_Dean-2009 lost him there. He said a few other things but oh, he _lost_ Castiel right there; right there he decided to lose the pretension of clarity and calm, and even 'interest;' let hysteria and manic laughter pop out, why the hell not. It was embarrassing as hell to have to say this because the Castiel that Dean-2009 had known is dead, washed up, flew away with the rest of the angels after all._

_"I wish I could just strap on my wings but uh... I'm sorry, no dice."_

_He laughed because it was tragic. And singularly embarrassing, to be seen like this. He realized that the erosion of his character was so gradual he barely even felt it sink its teeth and live inside him. He'd been watching Dean change so much he'd forgotten about himself. And now, to be looked at the way Dean-2009 looked at him, with trust in his ability and competence, and then to be seen as so drastically different from what he had been... god, thank god he was high. Because this won't be so funny later._

_"What are you, stoned?"_

_"Generally, yeah."_

_"What happened to you?"_

_The question hurt, because there was inextricable judgment there – _why are you less than what you were?

_"Life."_

_Subtext: _It's not my fault_. _

" " "

He nicknamed them 2014 and 2009. There was an impersonality to numbers that he found comforting.

2009 stirred the camp up all right, and Castiel was tempted to laugh at all of them fools and say, _"Isn't this what we all wanted? More of the bastard to go around and toil for us?"_

Things started moving faster after 2009 arrived, as if the eyes of the gods were turned their way again. For the longest time there was just the monotony of subsistence. Suddenly there was a gun that can kill the devil. Suddenly there was a mission more important than anything ever attempted before.

_"We were in Jane's cabin last night and apparently, we and Rissa have a connection," 2009 obtusely filled in 2014, and again, Castiel was tempted to say it was just as well that there was now two of them._

_"We don't have to find Lucifer we know where he is..." 2014 said, trying to keep everyone on-topic and incidentally, benefiting by re-focusing the team and keeping Rissa's fists away from his face._

_He said it with certainty, defended his knowledge and how he had acquired it without question, prompting 2009 to remark, "So we're torturing again. Well that's good. Classy."_

_Castiel laughed. He laughed because it was funny. He laughed because he missed laughing. He looked up at 2009, found his eyes felt like they were crinkling, crow's feet, laughing eyes. He hasn't felt that in a long time._

_2014 didn't like it. _

_"What?" Castiel told him shamelessly, "I like Past-You."_

_2014 proceeded with explaining the plan. He must have felt like he was teaching a kindergarten class after someone spiked the water fountain with sugar and soda; jealous girlfriend, sarcastic twin, a high fallen angel, all in one room, no one paying any real attention._

_"Are you saying my plan is reckless?" 2014 asked of Castiel's critique._

Hell yes, _he was._

_"Are you coming?"_

Has he ever left him alone?

" " "

2009 rode with him on the way to the mission-site. There was no question to it, that 2009 kind of just trailed after him, like 2009 magnetized to the one sanity that place offered and that was just too damn bad for the both of them.

Castiel received him with some regret; he needed some amphetamines, take the edge off of the absinthe he'd taken earlier. Later, he'd take something else to take the edge off of the amphetamines and then something to take the edge off of that. Slippery slope, but whatever. Humanity has gone sliding down off of mountains for fun for ages, have jumped off of cliffs... But there was still something in him that hated having to take a pill in front of 2009. But he needed it, so whatever. He reached over, pretended to be casual about the whole thing, even offered 2009 some and hoping to hell he would say no at the same time.

"Amphetamines?" 2009 asked.

"Perfect antidote to that absinthe," Castiel defend- _explained_. Explained, that was a better word.

"Don't get me wrong, Cas, I uh..." Dean said, and _oh god _he was in for it now, "I'm happy that the stick is out of your ass but what's going on? W-what's with the drugs and the orgies and the love-guru crap?"

He laughed. He laughed because that was all he could do.

"What's so funny?"

"Dean, I'm not an angel anymore."

And then he tortured them both with the quick and dirty version of his life of the last few years. _I went mortal. They left. I'm powerless. I'm hopeless. _

And he tortured them even more with the lie he's been telling himself for years.

"Why the hell not bury myself in women and decadence? Right, it's the end, maybe? That's what decadence is for. Why not bang a few gongs before the lights go out. But then... that's just how I roll."

" " "

There was something wrong with the plan.

He'd known it, almost from it's reckless, suicidal get-go.

_"They'll never see us coming," 2014 had guaranteed, "Trust me."_

_2009 asked to speak to 2014 privately and Castiel glanced at them as they stepped out of earshot. He kept one eye to them, and another eye toward their target. Their voices were low, indecipherable. But he knew how they moved, and how they reacted because damn – once upon a time, he had known them inside-out, having once restored their bodies, bit by bit, back to Earth and back to health. He knew them by the rings on their fingertips, the lines on their palms..._

_The argument turned heated. And then 2014 decked 2009 and 2009 just. dropped. It should never be forgotten that they were different in many ways, and 2014 was just all the more uncompromising and vicious._

Castiel stood up from his crouch then, and jogged up to them.

"Crap, Dean!" he exclaimed, and knew that they were now being watched by everyone else. Dean threw a hand up to the team, indicating that he would welcome no one else forward.

"The hell was that for?!" Castiel demanded, crouching down next to the fallen 2009 and checking on him.

"He's fine, I can take a hit," 2014 said dismissively, not noticing the quirkiness of that remark, "Now can we just get on with this? We got a job to do here."

Castiel, convinced that 2009 didn't break anything, glared up at 2014 hotly, "What was that for." He said it in plain menace because, damn it, as long as Dean was around – 2009, that is, he damn well could find some old part of himself too.

2014 stared him down for a long moment. He blinked, like he was remembering something. "They cleared a path for us. Which means--"

"This is a trap," Castiel concluded, "But... but we're going through the front."

"You're the decoys," 2014 said, eyes steely, like he's made up his mind. It sounded like a confession. People confessed too, when they were about to die, didn't they...?

"You're going through the back," Castiel deduced, sticking to strategy because that was the one thing that was clear, and the one thing he could voice.

"I'm gonna feed my friends into a meat grinder," 2014 babbled on, as if having started the confession meant he couldn't stop, "You too. I will use your deaths as a diversion."

It hurt to hear, the sheer functionality of all of this. It _hurt_ to hear. But god, it must have hurt to _say _it too, right? It should have hurt him to say it? Because 2014 looked like he was getting ready to be punched and clawed and condemned, and his eyes turned liquid and deep, and the last time Castiel had seen them look so regretful was when he was ill, calling for his family.

Castiel closed his eyes, then looked mournfully down at 2009 – _Dean_ as he knew and loved him, lying unconscious, face-down on the ground. He put a hand on Dean's shoulder, lowered his head to Dean's ear. He prayed he would be heard, like he hasn't prayed in a long, long time.

"Don't ever change," he whispered, and he had a feeling he was heard, because something in his subconscious stirred, and the moment he said it the words sounded familiar, as if it was something that someone else had told him. Time-jumps were strange like that; the future becoming the past, the past becoming the future, all of them part of a non-linear destiny. Maybe things would be different. Maybe he wouldn't have to live all these damned miserable years.

"_Don't ever change," he was told, a warm palm on his right shoulder, standing on the side of a long, lonely road..._

"So you coming or what?" 2014 asked him, and those eyes were all injury masked by mission and desperation.

"I'd have followed this poor bastard to the ends of the earth," Castiel said, patting 2009 on the shoulder and staring at him endearingly, before looking up at 2014 with more spunk, "I have."

"And me?" 2014 asked, emphasizing that they were different.

"You'd have to ask," Castiel said with a smirk, "_Nicely_."

2014 just looked at him knowingly, and there was that light in his eyes, that little glimmer that showed Castiel 2009 was buried deep, but never gone. Dean didn't ask him to follow, much less nicely. As a matter of fact, he turned his back on Castiel and walked away.

The angel stood up and walked after him.

Almost imperceptibly, Dean slowed down, and they walked side by side.

The End

May 5, 2010

**Thanks so much** for taking the time to read, and I do hope you drop me a line to let me know what you think. As always, I welcome your c&c's, and hope you join me for the Next Chapter:

**Commit Me Here, **which is s_et after_ Heaven and Hell, Free to Be You and Me, and Abandon All Hope_: Ana, Castiel and Jo Harvelle have all heard Dean Winchester's best line. _

Thanks again and 'til the next post!!!


	3. Abandon All Hope: Commit Me Here

Author: Mirrordance

Title: **Ever This Day**

Summary: A series of one-shots of Dean as seen through the eyes of his overburdened, self-appointed guardian angel. Chapter 3, set after Abandon All Hope_: Jo Harvelle, Ana and Castiel have all – at some point - heard Dean Winchester's best line._

**Hi guys!**

**First off**, thanks to all who read, alerted, favorited and especially all who reviewed the previous installment of _Ever this Day _and the previous installment of my current work-in-progress, _Less Traveled By. _I was working on LTB actually and got stuck, so I started reading through some of my older fics to reacquaint myself with some ideas and styles that I was more comfortable with and then just stumbled into this unpublished chapter of _Ever this Day_. I realized I've been so busy (I was fandom-MIA for months and months, got swallowed up by RL haha) that Chapter 3 just sat there in my computer, essentially finished but forgotten. The current dating of this fic of when I finished writing it is just because I tweaked it a bit, but it's been mostly done for months, and I apologize for keeping those who have been following this fic waiting!

I hope this fic still interests those who have read chapters 1 and 2. For those who have not read them, you don't need to do that to read Chapter 3. I am also currently working on a fourth chapter :) Anyway, ramble ramble, I know. As always, I look forward to hearing your thoughts and heartily welcome your c&c's. Without further ado, Chapter 3 of _Ever this Day_, "Commit Me Here:"

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**Ever This Day**

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**Chapter 3: Commit Me Here**

After Abandon All Hope_: Jo Harvelle, Ana and Castiel have all – at some point - heard Dean Winchester's best line._

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_Tiktiktik..._

The crisp, high-pitched, low-volume clinking sound pierced the late night quiet as he picked up the tiny glasses from on top of the wooden kitchen table. He placed one finger inside each shot glass, then pulled his digits together, clustering the glasses for a more efficient delivery to the sink. The smell of liquor was sweet-bitter acid, tickling his nose. Odd corners of the glasses were still moist, round drops of bereft alcoholic beverage and maybe just the remnants of the kiss of a woman's lips, on the rims.

He heard a shuffling behind him and for a long moment, he considered flitting away. But the fact that the intruder was already on his way over meant that he was already discovered anyway and so he held his ground, continued his work without pause.

"What do you think you're doing?" the breathy voice asked from behind him. Dean stood by the doors of Bobby Singer's kitchen, leaning on the frame. His clothes were rumpled, his hair sticking out over his head, all from much-needed sleep. But his eyes were clear, thoughtful.

"These have been laying out here for the last two days," Castiel replied of the glasses, taking them to the sink, "I partook of these drinks, and am now the only one left to clean up after us."

Dean cocked an eyebrow at him, "You're washing the glasses."

The angel shrugged, "I can do a great many things."

"Fair enough," Dean said. He pursed his lips in thought, walked over and offered Castiel a palm-up, "Gimme one of those, will you?"

Castiel frowned, but did as he was told, "Why?"

"Why do you think?" Dean asked back, turning his back on Castiel and the sink and picking up a bottle of tequila on the table. He poured himself a shot.

"Should you be doing that?" Castiel asked, "What with the medicine you've been taking."

"I'm not taking anything," Dean said automatically.

"The ones for your head," Castiel pointed out, "You are not supposed to-"

"I've had concussions before," Dean said, waving a dismissive hand at the issue, "This one ain't so bad. I'll live." He gave the angel a mocking salute, and then downed the shot in a gulp. He hissed in satisfaction at the burning line the liquor trailed down his throat. Once the sensation faded, he brought a finger to his lip thoughtfully and murmured, "Well what do you know. Lipstick."

"Huh?"

"The glass you gave me," Dean cleared his throat, "It was Jo's. I can still taste her on it." The realization had him reaching for the bottle and another gulp, this time ditching the glass and laying it on top of the table.

"I am sorry," Castiel said carefully, "For the loss of your friends."

"Yeah," Dean said, before his eyes turned steely, "Hey I've been meaning to ask – where were you anyway, when all that shit was going down?"

Castiel stared at him for a long moment. The question was something Dean had asked him before, a number of times in the last few days, as a matter of fact. Sam explained that Dean had had hit his head and was forgetting things, but that he should be better soon. Dean would ask the same question the same way every time, and every time, Castiel kept looking for... he wasn't entirely sure. Accusation, maybe – _why weren't you there, why did you leave them_ – and instead just finding... a question. A simple, straightforward question, with judgment to be reserved. It was surprisingly fair.

"I observed something anomalous," Castiel explained now as he had many times before in the last few days, "I excused myself to find out more, and found myself captured."

"About that," Dean said, and Castiel could tell by the glint in his eye and the build-up to his tone that he was going to attempt humor, "You're gonna sit down with Sammy and me one of these days and we're gonna watch a horror movie."

This was a new response to the days-old question and Castiel's unchanging answer, and the angel figured Dean must truly be feeling better now that he was being more clever. Castiel knowingly took the bait of being the straight man in the comedic pair, out of both mercy and for his own comfort, "Why would we do such a thing?"

"Everyone in a horror movie knows they're not supposed to split up and go off on their own," Dean said, "And you're also not supposed to say 'I'll be right back.'"

"I didn't say 'I'll be right back'," Castiel pointed out, feeling a little bit confused now.

Dean's face fell. "Never mind."

Castiel turned the water up, and the hissy splashing sound lorded over the quiet kitchen. It overwhelmed the subtle sound of wood scraping against floor, as Dean sat on top of the table behind him, legs swinging, bottle of liquor in his hand.

"Where'd you pick that up?" Dean asked, nodding in the direction of the dishwashing.

"It is simple and requires no tutelage," Castiel replied, "Maybe it is a distant memory of this vessel's. But I believe it is also natural instinct, to know to wash things."

"Yeah," Dean snorted, "Maybe there is something instinctive about using _Dawn _over there, in a fresh, clean orange-y scent."

"Baptism is a washing from original sin," Castiel expounded as he worked, "Floods too, have purified cities. And you know... God's Son Himself washed the feet of His disciples."

"Just wash the dishes, Cas," Dean sighed.

He did, one by one, and carefully.

"Is your head better?" Castiel asked into the quiet, not bothering to turn to face Dean and be lied to.

"Yes," came the expected reply, "I told you I've taken lots of hits before, and this wasn't so bad. Apparently, the devil can survive the gun that can kill almost everything else, but still hit like a girl."

"You've been sleeping most of the time since you got here," Castiel said, "And your brother and Bobby were getting worried."

"It's like having two wives at the same time," Dean agreed gravely.

"They mean well," Castiel responded mildly, "And it's not so strange for people to close ranks and keep those they love nearby almost fanatically, after so recent and so fierce a loss. I would indulge them, if I were you."

Dean just shrugged, "All that wife-nagging without the wife-sex? No thanks. Oh hey," he called out to Castiel as he tossed the glass he had ceased from using, "Head's up."

The angel caught it easily, just as he had caught the quick, goodbye-squeeze Dean had given the glass before tossing it Castiel's way. The same way he caught Dean's mild regret that he had caught the thing and it hadn't smashed to the floor in a mess of pieces.

The angel started washing the shotglass along with the others, mixed them up, hoping it would be indiscriminate and that he'd forget which one had been used by the dead girl.

"They were good people," Castiel said quietly.

"Yeah well," replied Dean, "Try getting clocked by that chick on the nose. Now _that _one, she hit like a linebacker on steroids," he winced in recollection, "Who took 'em with an acid chaser."

"They were very brave," Castiel went on, "And dignified."

"You're telling me," Dean said, pretending to be obtuse and trying to stay on shallower waters as he brought the bottle again to his lips, "I tried doing the 'last night on Earth' thing with Jo? And I crashed and burned."

"'Last night on Earth?'" Castiel echoed.

"You know," Dean expounded emphatically, "Dangerous mission coming, you can all die, so it's high time to eat, drink and be merry and whatever else you wanna get off your freaky head? _Last night on earth_."

"Ah," Castiel said, sounding enlightened, "You've tried that with me once."

Dean choked on his liquor, "Dude," he coughed, "I would never-no, what the heck are you talking about?"

"We were going to trap Raphael and speak with him," Castiel expounded, "And I told you it was not likely that I would emerge from the encounter alive. You said it was my last night on earth, and asked me what I wanted to do."

"Oh, right," Dean remembered, "I brought you to a whorehouse, Cas, that's different. I meant I tried to kiss Jo and so on, you know. So it's different. _Sheesh_. I wouldn't try _that _with you."

"You should have been more clear," Castiel told him.

"I'll remember that," Dean said wryly. He turned pensive after a moment, saying, "You know... I know more dead people than alive people." He drowned the rest of the thought with another gulp off of his drink. Castiel drowned it differently.

"You've had several last nights on earth," Castiel remarked, wanting to spare him from more drinking by attempting some levity, "It's kind of self-defeating."

"Well how was I supposed to know I would always survive?" Dean snapped, "Oh but you're right though. Huh. How about that. I mean there was Ana-"

"I do not wish to hear about that-"

"_Awesome _last night on Earth, that," Dean went on, "And then there's you, and this last one, with Jo. I'm like a freaking Ebola monkey."

"A what?"

"A carrier of the plague," Dean clarified, "Everything I touch, man..."

Somewhere in there the conversation shifted, and Dean had turned serious again, introspective. Maybe it was the abundance of the liquor he was consuming, maybe it was that compounded by the medicine he was taking. Maybe it was just this most recent, harrowing loss, picking at his scabs and exposing the wounds beneath.

"I tended to think about her like a kid," Dean said quietly, "I mean she was pretty and all, but... I don't know. Something about her. She was so... _young_. I think it's 'cos she had a mom whom I knew. Everyone who's got a mom is just a kid, no matter how old they are. 's that make sense?"

_It made sense for people who looked at the world like an orphan_, Castiel thought, but dared not say.

"I kissed her," Dean confessed, "She was dying and we all knew it, and she looked at me like it's all she wanted from me. No asking to save her, no asking to make her sacrifice count, just... just a goodbye kiss. That was all, like it was so simple. She was... she really was just a kid."

Dean sniffed a little, and laughed at himself, self-deprecating, "That sounds worse out loud than in my head. Like I'm blowing my own horn or whatever-"

- Castiel wasn't sure what that meant -

"- Singin' my own praises," Dean clarified almost automatically, catching the confusion of the uninitiated and adjusting his statement, "I'm not sayin' she thought I was the main event of her life or whatever or that she was in love with me. I'm just sayin'... she's just a girl, she's just a kid, the things she wanted in life, you know. And she didn't deserve to go out like that. Gut busted up, bleeding and in pain before... before she got saddled with blowing herself up. With her mother beside her. _God_, Cas. Now _that_ sounds even worse out loud than in my head."

"They believed in what you were fighting for," Castiel told him, "They believed in _you_. People have died for far less."

"And a lot of good it did them," Dean said bitterly, "Or you, for that matter."

This time, Castiel faced him. "I could hate you only insofar as I can hate the truth; you were correct with what you said about knowing the difference between right and wrong. I knew it, and I recognized it, and I found no other recourse in good conscience but to follow it. I am certain the case had been the same for them. For some people... you can't not do the right thing, once you know what it is."

"I don't know what it is."

Castiel tilted his head at Dean thoughtfully, "Well they did. And I do. And for whatever reason, this has something to do with you."

Dean scratched at the back of his neck, uncomfortably, "You ever heard of the Pied Piper? About this dude with a flute of some kind who led rats all the way to go over the edge of a cliff."

Castiel wasn't entirely sure how the seemingly random statement applied, but hazarded a fair enough guess, "Well you must not worry so much about that - I happen to have wings."

The End

November 10, 2010

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**Next Installment to **_**Ever this Day**_**: Chapter 4 - "Angel of God"**

_After _Free to Be You and Me: _As the search for God continues, Castiel comes upon what he first thought to be a fairly simple solution – Let Dean die and wait for God to intervene, or make him look for God in Heaven. It is a loss much harder to bear than he anticipated._

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Thanks for reading. 'Til the next post!


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